"Lung cancer" should be familiar to everyone, this is the most high incidence of malignant tumors in the mainland, the largest number of deaths!
Relevant research and investigation show that the number of newly diagnosed lung cancer patients in the mainland has exceeded 800,000 every year. Of these patients, only a very small number are also very fortunate to be in the stage of carcinoma in situ or local invasion.
Most of the rest of the patients have entered the metastases, infiltrates, and even extensive metastases, so the overall prognosis of lung cancer is extremely poor, in China, nearly 700,000 people die of lung cancer every year.
It is difficult to diagnose lung cancer in the early stage because the clinical manifestations of lung cancer are extremely complex, and the symptoms and signs appear early and late, light and severe, and are related to a variety of factors;
This includes the specific location and pathological type of tumor, pathological stage, patient response and tolerance, and so on.
Most patients with early stage lung cancer have very mild symptoms, or even no symptoms.
So the question is, early diagnosis of lung cancer is of great significance for treatment, what tests can find lung cancer?
1. X-ray examination: This includes three categories: chest x-ray examination, chest CT, low-dose spiral CT examination and so on.
The key point to be mentioned here is the low-dose spiral CT, which uses the smallest scanning range, the lowest dose and the minimum amount of x-ray to make a diagnosis of the lesion site.
Compared with traditional CT examination, its radiation is smaller, and tiny nodules can also be seen clearly.
These tests can help to understand lung health, detect early cancerous changes in the lungs, tumor location and size, and may also see local emphysema due to bronchial obstruction, atelectasis, invasive lesions or inflammation in the vicinity of the lesion;
2. Bronchoscopy: If there is a typical lung cancer symptom, such as long-term unexplained cough, blood in sputum, bronchial obstruction or diffuse changes in the lungs, bronchoscopy can be used for examination.
It is the use of about 0 .6cm in diameter bronchoscopy, after the implementation of local anesthesia of the throat, through the mouth, nasal cavity, or by tracheostomy opening, the lung lobe, segment and subsegment bronchial lesions are observed, it can find early lung lesions.
In the presence of suspicious lesions, bronchoscopy can also be used to remove tissue for pathological examination to confirm the diagnosis and determine the type of histology;
3. Chest section exploration surgery: If the lump in the lungs has been found through imaging examination, but after multiple examinations and short-term diagnostic treatment, the specific pathological nature of the tumor is still not clear, and the possibility of lung cancer has not been ruled out.
In order to avoid missing the best time for diagnosis and treatment of the disease, caesarean exploration surgery should be performed according to the doctor's recommendation;
4. Mediastinoscopy: this examination is mainly suitable for patients with comprehensive lymph node metastasis, but is not suitable for surgical treatment and other methods cannot obtain pathological diagnosis.
During the examination of the mediastinum, the doctor will use special biopsy forceps to peel off the lymph node tissue from the dissected site, and then perform a pathological biopsy of the lymph node tissue, so that the nature of the patient's tumor can be determined;
5. Sputum cytology: This is the simplest and most effective way in lung cancer screening and diagnostic examination, that is, to check the patient's sputum.
The reason for choosing this method is that patients with primary lung cancer will have symptoms such as cough, sputum coughing, and blood in sputum after the disease has developed to a certain extent, and most patients have fallen cancer cells in sputum.
Relevant studies have shown that the positive rate of sputum cytology in patients with central lung cancer can reach about 70 to 90%, and the positive rate of sputum test in patients with peripheral lung cancer is about 50%.
It should be emphasized that there are many lung cancer screening programs, but it is not suitable for everyone to screen for lung cancer.
In fact, from a clinical point of view, lung cancer screening is only suitable for high-risk groups of lung cancer, such as high-risk groups with a family history of lung cancer, long-term smoking history, occupational exposure history, and a history of chronic lung diseases, and it is necessary to conduct regular screening.